Good morning and welcome back to the Tip Sheet, a weekly newsletter from Tom Dudchik’s Capitol Report and Mike Cerulli.

In this week’s Tip Sheet:

• Is 2024 shaping up to be the Gen Z election in CT? 

• Yale protests make national headlines

• Lamont and Ritter on ‘Capitol Report’

• And, please…can we stop with the cringe Taylor Swift content from politicians?

Gen Z Candidates Lining Up

With the legislature barreling toward sine die, attention is increasingly shifting toward November and the elections that will decide the balance of power in Hartford.

As candidates make last-minute entrances into key races across the state, one trend is becoming clear: more Gen Z candidates are running for office than ever before.

For those not familiar, demographers typically define Gen Z as having birth years beginning in the mid-to-late 1990s and ending around 2010 —meaning the oldest “zoomers” are currently entering their late twenties and the youngest are just starting high school.

Connecticut has already had one Gen Z lawmaker: former State Senator Will Haskell. The Westport native was born in 1996, placing him on the upper edge of what can be acceptably considered Gen Z. 

Other younger legislators, such as Joe Hoxha and Jack Fazzino, sit on the Millennial side of the Millenial/Gen Z line of demarcation that bisects the 1990s.

The small but notable crop of Gen Z candidates who have already announced or are preparing to formally launch their campaigns hail from all over the state.

In the 117th House District, Milford Democrat MJ Shannon is seeking to unseat incumbent Republican Charles Ferraro. Shannon is currently a clerk for the Senate Democrats.

In the 52nd House District, Woodstock Democrat Ethan Werstler is readying a challenge to incumbent Republican Kurt Vail. Wrestler is currently a lobbyist with Rome, Smith, Lutz, and Kowalski.

In the 65th House District, the Tip Sheet has learned that a well-connected Gen Z Republican is preparing to launch a challenge to incumbent Democrat Michelle Cook.

The 65th represents a particularly competitive race. In 2020, Cook won re-election by less than three hundred votes.

The Tip Sheet has spoken with several others who are still in the process of deciding whether or not to join the ranks of Gen Z candidates in the coming weeks.

The wave of Gen Z candidates across the state could mean an injection of energy into races that have previously been written off by one or both parties.

Finding young, energetic candidates might be particularly helpful for the Senate Republican caucus. The folks at SRO are facing the difficult task of defending three vulnerable incumbents (Tony Hwang, Ryan Fazio, and Lisa Seminara) with no clear opportunities for a pick-up.

Just as Haskell overthrew an incumbent who had won her previous election by more than twenty points, another young candidate might find themselves catching political lightning in a bottle in an election cycle that promises to be unpredictable.

Pro-Palestine Protesters at Yale Make National Headlines

This weekend, hundreds of pro-Palestine protesters established an encampment in Yale’s Beinecke Plaza. The demonstrations occurred in tandem with and in response to similar protests at Columbia University. More than 100 students were arrested last week while protesting on Columbia’s campus.

The protests at Yale centered on demands for the university to divest from weapons manufacturers, particularly those that do business with the Israeli Defense Forces.

On both Yale and Columbia’s campuses, tensions have run high between protesters and counterprotesters.

You can read the Yale Daily News’ reporting here.

The group Yalies 4 Palestine has been driving much of the organizing efforts. Their Instagram provides good insights into the goals of the demonstrations.

The pro-Israel activist and Yale student Sahar Tartak told the New York Post that she was assaulted by a protester. You can read that account here.

The White House also put out a statement in which the President Biden condemned accounts of antisemitic displays at the Columbia protests saying, “blatant Antisemitism is reprehensible and dangerous—and it has absolutely no place on college campuses, or anywhere in our country.”

ICYMI: Lamont and Ritter Chum it Up on ‘Capitol Report’

Gov. Ned Lamont joined the ‘Capitol Report’ panel for a lively Sunday morning episode. Lamont shared his thoughts on how the legislature would resolve differences over the budget and laid out a number of his own initiatives—including efforts to ease the burden of student loans on Connecticut residents.

House Speaker Matt Ritter appeared on the program and offered his now-familiar refrain that legislators will come to an agreement on the budget “well before May 8th.”

Lamont also fielded suggestions from three outspoken Republicans on what he should be more focused on. Rob Sampson, Greg Howard, and Joe Polletta all honed in on different local issues that they wanted to bring to the attention of the Governor.

You can watch the whole program here.

The ‘Tortured Staffer Department’...

Today, in government offices across Connecticut, numerous communications staffers will undoubtedly be in their group chats and morning meetings pitching their bosses on the same idea: Taylor Swift-themed content.

The release of Swift’s latest studio album has spawned numerous posts from organizations and politicians trying to get in the good graces of the internet’s most powerful fandom.

Gov. Lamont was one of the first politicians in the entire country to post content related to Swift’s latest album, ‘The Tortured Poets Department,’ when it was announced earlier in the year.

The avowed Deadhead also dressed up as Travis Kelce for Halloween last year. Lamont is just one of dozens of politicians who’ve sought to glom on to Swift’s singular ascendence into the pop culture stratosphere.

But, does anyone actually believe that these politicians are die hard fans of Swift?

Certainly, a percentage of our elected officials are legitimate Swfities. They know the lore and they’ve stuck with Swift through her many years of trials and tribulations. But one gets the sense that many of the latest Swift-related posts are exactly what they seem to be: staff-driven attempts to make their bosses seem more in-touch.

One Connecticut elected official, Sean Scanlon, has preemptively disavowed any ‘TTPD’ content that might appear on his official accounts. Matt Blumenthal had a disapproving response to Scanlon's tweet—the Stamford representative was diligently working his way through the entire album.

Observant Tip Sheet readers may recall that Scanlon listed The 1975 as one of his most-listened to artists in our Spotify Wrapped round-up last year. If you don’t know who The 1975 are or why they’re relevant to the current discussion around Swift’s latest album, consider that a sign that you shouldn’t be trying to engage with the Swift stans online.

So, why does any of this matter? What harm does a little performative stanning do in the grand scheme of things?

In short, the public sees right through it. At a time when trust in government institutions is at an all time low, our elected officials only add to the problem by engaging in fake fandom. Is it the end of the world? No. But ultimately, it does the opposite of what well-intentioned comms staffers are aiming for. It reinforces the idea, mainly to an audience of young people, that politicians are nothing more than vapid cynics willing to say or do anything to get attention.

So, please, let's leave the 'TTPD' discourse to the fans. Connecticut politicians can focus on something else...like, you know, their jobs.